Running backs' lucky number no longer 1,000

BARRY WILNERAssociated Press

Published Saturday, December 20, 2003

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Benchmark is no longer 1,000 yards

AP Graphic Year after year, NFL running backs surge far past the 1,000-yard mark that has been the measuring stick for success. Many of those runners, though, acknowledge that shooting for 1,000 yards these days is aiming for mediocrity.

"That was the standard when it was a 12-game season," the Giants' Tiki Barber says. "That was exceptional, 1,000 yards in 12 games. Now, how many guys in the league have 1,000? It's still something to be proud of, but I think the guys who have done it, they look to get significantly past it, 1,400 yards, 1,600 yards. I'm of that same mentality."

As are plenty of his colleagues who note that 1,000 yards in a 16-game season translates to just 62.5 yards a game. That is not particularly impressive.

While 2,000 yards has not become the standard, nor ever likely will, pursuing 1,400 or 1,500 yards is more logical, and a lot more noteworthy than just getting over the century mark.

Consider that no fewer than 14 players have rushed for at least 1,000 yards in every season since 1997. Already this year, with two games remaining, 14 have done it and six others are within close range.

"It's a lot easier," says Jamal Lewis, the league's leading rusher.

The Ravens star has 1,747 yards, with an outside shot at the elusive 2,000-yard barrier that only four players have surpassed.

"I'm not going to say it's easy, but it's a 16-game season and if you're doing your job and the guys around you are doing their job, 1,000 yards is pretty easy to get," Lewis says.

Adds the Jaguars' Fred Taylor, who has had four 1,000-yard seasons in six years, including 1,257 this year: "If you're going to be a starting running back in this league, 1,000 yards shouldn't be your goal. If you're in the game, it's like 70 yards or so a game.

"If you're going to set your standards that low, you shouldn't even be in this league."

In each of his nine seasons in the league, Curtis Martin has gained more than 1,000 yards. Only Barry Sanders, with 10, had more 1,000-yard seasons.

"I think, of course, 1,000 is difficult to get," Martin says. "It's not easy at all. But at the same time, that benchmark I think is rising. I don't know exactly where it's at but it's definitely rising ... because there are a lot of people who will go over 1,000 yards this year."

Why has 1,000 yards become easier to achieve than a decade ago, when 10 players surpassed it, or 1991, when seven managed it?

For one, with multiple offensive sets, running backs are coming at defenses from different angles and in a variety of plays rarely seen in the 1980s.

Halfbacks are more versatile as well. Because a Marshall Faulk or Priest Holmes is such a threat in the passing game, it often opens up the running game.

Also, the quality of tackling has fallen off precipitously in recent seasons. Runners who break through the first wall of tacklers often wind up close to or in the end zone.

"The game is so much more wide open," Dolphins safety Sammy Knight says. "In the old days they used to run between the tackles, and you'd have a lot of people around you. Now there are so many more one-on-one situations, and you have guys always trying to make the big hit instead of the easy tackle. It's a combination for missed tackles."

And when those tackles are missed, Lewis, Clinton Portis and Deuce McAllister are gone.

"You're getting a lot of one-back runs, and they're talented guys," Broncos defensive coordinator Larry Coyer says. "They get in space and you're in trouble. You have a hard time with them.

"What happens is somebody misses a tackle and you're in big trouble because they can strike you from anywhere. All of them can. They can hit you from any distance. It really stresses you, makes you have to work real hard."

Reaching 1,000 yards still is hard work, or else even the most ordinary of runners would get there each year. It simply is not a breathtaking achievement in the current NFL.

Some runners actually embrace the challenge of reaching 2,000 yards. Ricky Williams once predicted he would do it, but hasn't yet. Lewis at one point was on pace to approach Eric Dickerson's record of 2,105, but has fallen back.

"Two-thousand is the mark of a really elite back," says McAllister, an elite back himself.

"You've only had four or five running backs that have been able to do that. To reach that number you've really had an amazing season. That doesn't happen often.

"I can't say that you should raise the bar to 2,000 yards for your so-called good backs. If you can achieve it it's something to push for."